Endoscopes of this type are held and guided by the surgeon in the fingers of one hand when performing surgery. The fingers seize the endoscope by its main body.
The surgeon must manually move the endoscope in order, for example, to insert it into an aperture in a patient's body. This insertion entails rotating, pivoting, pushing and pulling the endoscope which is furthermore required to exactly follow the surgeon's manual guidance to prevent injury to the patient's tissue or vessels.
As a result, absolutely reliable gripping contact between the fingers of the guiding hand and the endoscope must be assured. The surgeon's other hand holds the proximal end of an operative tool inserted into the endoscope's operative duct and, by driving that tool, performs specific functions at the site of surgery.
Endoscopes of this type are used in particular in the form of ureteroscopes. The surgeon must insert the ureteroscope through the patient's urethra, pass it through the bladder space and then guide the ureteroscope through the ostium into the ureter. The described path is traversed while rotating, pivoting and pushing the ureteroscope. Reliable gripping contact between the fingers of the guiding hand and the ureteroscope must be assured to preclude injuring delicate tissue, for instance the bladder or ureter, by unintended ureteroscope displacements.
Conventional endoscopes incur the substantial drawback of lacking dedicated gripping surfaces. Such endoscopes are seized at arbitrary sites, almost anywhere on the main body which, however, does not allow secure and convenient gripping. Truly safe handling cannot be achieved. Because the main body is seized in a more or less unconstrained manner, there may follow undesired actuation of functional elements such as valves, switches or the like.